Sunday, April 22, 2007

Addiction is a terrible thing, and it's hitting our children at such an early age.

Below is an email I recieved from my sister-in-law (names have been left blank to protect the innocent. . .)

Her name is __________ and she is a "bink-aholic". For the past 3 years she has needed a 'bink' as soon as she woke up, when she was in the car, when she played, when she watched TV, when she met new people, to go to sleep and even in the middle of the night she would wake up for a 'bink'. The only time she didn't require a 'bink', was bath time and to eat and even then she would still have her 'bink' within arms reach.

Both _____ and I take full responsibility of enabling her in her addiction because she was a lot more fun when she was 'binking'! :)

I have spent a lot of time praying this week, for much needed strength, in not breaking down and getting her a 'bink', especially at naptime.

She has gone through a lot of withdrawal this week and hit the sorrow, anger and regret stages, but we are proud to say she has been 'bink' free for 7 days!!

She still asks for a 'bink' every once in a while, so if you see her and she tries to sneak one from you, please do not give her any!

We appreciate your support and prayers while we continue with her recovery.

Love, _____, _____ and a new (more violent, vocal, moody) ______ :)

P.S. It actually hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be! She only beat me up 4 times and I only yelled at her once!

Well, I'm here to say I support this wonderful family and I, myself, am a fully recovered 'bink-aholic.' (I gave mine to Santa when I was 3).

Seriously. . .how many times do you get in your car and hear only the last two lines of a fab song? Or catch the end of the Entertainment report and miss the 'important' gossip? I need to be able to just push the rewind and hear it again.

My kids are onto it too! They hear a song they like, then say, play that one again mom! After I say, "sorry babe, it's just the radio, we can't rewind it." They're as disappointed as I am when I catch up to live TV on my DVR and actually have to, gasp, watch commercials.

So, my birthday is coming up in May. . .anyone wanna get on that one and get me a DVR-radio?

Friday, April 13, 2007

Christy and I went to a fabulous show last night to celebrate her birthday!! (It was a late night, so I'm seeing if I can beat her to the posting this morning!! Ready, Set, Go!)

We went to see Jason Mraz at the Rococo Theater here in town. It was a bit sentimental. . .you see the Rococo theater is the old "Stuart Theater". In it's day, it was THE place in downtown. It opened in the 20's and had the best shows there. It has regular orchestral seating, a balcony, and then a large 2nd balcony. Later on, it became a regular movie theater. The acoustics are fabulous so everyone wanted to see the big shows there. I saw ET there, and remember seeing several others as a kid. When all the Star Wars films were re-released (with all their audio splendor), we knew we had to see them at the Stuart. I can remember waiting for tickets for the midnight shows. We also saw the first Mission Impossible there (dun, dun, DUN, DUN, dun, dun, DUN, DUN, dododo, dododo, dododo, dodo). It eventually kind of fell apart, with the wrong people in charge, but a new group stepped in and completely restored it. It now has 'vegas-style' booths on the main floor and regular seating in the balconies. It's awesome. Here's some pictures I took from their website.

Here's the view from the balcony, and check out this chandelier!!Oh wait, SO the show!!

I was a little worried for Mraz, he had a big act to follow. . .but he did just fine.

Raul is a fabulous musician, and literally a one-man-band. He just came out plugged in his guitar and went. But throughout, you could hear and feel the beats of percussion, bass guitar, and he even does an amazing jazz trumpet with his mouth. (you seriously were looking around for the trumpeter!)

So I checked out his website and have already bought his first album off itunes. Seriously, click the link above and go to the site, and watch the live song (I swear while he was playing I just kept waiting for his hand to fall off it was moving so fast.) His second, from which he played some sweet tunes last night, comes out later this year. His sound is really soulful, jazzy, and has a lot of Latin influence. It's just that great driving, cleaning, dancing, singingalongto music. It's also fabulously positive!! And I don't know if this will be totally PC (oh, well!) but he's blind and I absolutely believe (at least with him) the idea that blind people make up for that 'loss' by totally rockin' in some other area!! Ok, so, if you didn't notice, that was a total 'shout-out' for Raul Midon!!

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

So Half.com is a great place to sell old books, CDs, movies, etc. . .that you're ready to pass along. Every few months I go through and see what I really could get rid of. You just put it on their site for no-certain-amount-of-time and every once in a blue moon you get a fun email that says

message: YOU'VE MADE A SALE!!

Well, usually I just print it off and cut out the address on the slip and send it out. But I'm a little nervous about todays sale.

The address is to a man in a nursing home

Bob Jones

C/O ________ nursing home

________ Road

Madison, WI 53714

Now usually they just address the letter that you put in the package by using their username from the site so here's what my letter says:

Friday, April 06, 2007

Ok, time for major catch-up. . .blogstyle. The beginning of the year is busy around our house with all the girls having their birthdays. So, here's a look at their parties and some pictures of them in their easter dresses this year. (Thank goodness I took those a couple weeks ago because it's freezing this weekend!!)

Madison had her birthday party a couple weeks before her birthday!!

We did a Luau (hawaiian, whatever you want to call it. . .all the decor/party favors were on clearance in Target's dollar section last summer, so I decided SOMEONE was having a Luau party!)

Matt's sister made her an awesome cake, with hula dancers and plenty of fish in the sea.Molly helped just a little in blowing out the candles.We had pizza (NOT hawaiian, just cheese), and lots of fresh fruit. . grapes, strawberries and lots of fresh pineapple. I was amazed at how many kids hadn't had it before!! It was all snatched up pretty quick. We also had strawberry smoothies to drink.I went online and found out everyone's 'Hawaiian' name, and made nametags. They sat down and had to try and guess who's name was who's. They tried to call each other that name the rest of the night. I taught them a hula (the 'Huki-lau'--Thanks Mom!), and we danced around and were silly. Matt drew a big coconut tree on poster board and we did pin the coconut on the coconut tree.

We made little flower pens (the ones you use a fake flower and use green floral tape to wrap it around a pen) for a craft. And Matt used his fingernail painting skills to do cute little flowers on their thumbs.

At the end of the party I took pictures of each of the guests doing a surf pose or a hula pose. See the finished product for the Thank yous below.Yes, Maddie and Molly are matching. I was surprised that they chose to!!I just found free photos online then used photoshop to put the girls in. (Thanks Tifffor helping me figure that out!) The hula picture had an awesome rainbow/mountain/hawaiian scene. I loved how the surf ones turned out.

Molly's big day was a couple weeks later. Hers, of COURSE, was a dog party.

We ordered tons of stuff (and cheap too!), from Oriental Trading Company. Dog ears/headband, and little stuffed dogs, dog-bone candy. When the kids arrived we gave them some ears to wear and they decorated a collar to play the 'pin the collar on the dog' game. Then we did face paint for all the new puppies and they also colored a tag to make their own collar.

I had bought the little stuffed dogs from OTC and so we had an adoption center that they all got to choose one from. Then we decorated doggy bowls with stickers and they made collars for their new pets too. I think they liked the face paint and picking a doggy name the best.Matt's sister made another cute cake for Molly with TONS of little dogs on it. She loved it.The funnest part was playing simon says with all dog commands!!Here they are all playing dead! Who knew I could get 5/6 year olds to behave so well??Here's our pin the collar on the doggy game.

Whitney's birthday comes next, she has the exact same birthday as Christy's little one, so we had them over for a little party.

Eva was excited about that candle, Whitney. . .not. . .so. . .much.Maddie and Molly had some fun too. . .mostly smearing the cool whip on each other.One of my favorite gifts for all of my girls has been their bitty babies. They each got them when they were around 2 years old. Right when they are in that total mommy mode. After Whitney opened hers, the other girls got theirs out, and they all were playing for about an hour. Suitcases, and clothes, and blankets, and bottles.Here they all are with their babes.A couple of days later we had our big family Sunday dinner at our house to celebrate Whitney's birthday. I made little ice cream cone cupcakes (my mom used to always make these for our birthdays when we were younger. . .such an easy way to make it not so messy). I put the little sucker in to be like a flower (ok, it's not so fancy, but Whitney liked it). MMM.

We gave Whitney lots of ballons for her party. I think that was her favorite. Here are the girls in their new easter dresses (from Childrens Place). I love the little sweaters and the prints.

Hmm. . .maybe NOT with those pink shoes Maddie (pick your battles. . .pick your battles.)Molly had to do the same little pose that Madison was doing on her bed. Birthday girl with her balloons!!We almost had to let her take them in the car. . .she would NOT let go (only for a sucker).Happy Easter!!!